Good morning, good morning I have a Greek test in less than an hour(Yikes!) so the end of this may be a little rushed, but bear with me.

Tip 1: The day before, avoid being killed by the creepy girl in class

Yesterday the girl who sat next to me in Latin class sharpened her pencil with a pocket knife. Who does that? This was also the same girl who complained about getting a shoe thrown at her by her old roommate. At first, I was on her side, but now I’m wondering what the real story behind that room situation was. And why this girl can’t get a 2 dollar pencil sharpener like everyone else. After class I went on a mission to get some new batteries for my food scale, but when I got to CVS I realized I had no idea what size I needed: bad Evan. The trip wasn’t a total waste because I took the Via challenge.

Via Taste Test

Tip 2: Load yourself up on caffeine

Do I fail, or does Starbucks win, because I thought the regular Pike’s Place was nasty and the Via was at least palatable. I normally get Pike’s Place decaf which I swear tasted better than that regular. I think Via will be a great thing if it’s widely available and affordable. I also grabbed lunch around this time:

This lunch was full of surprises. Surprise one was the ragout; I thought I’d hate it because it looked like it came back out of a dogs mouth and I have bad memories of black beans from my trip to Costa Rica in 8th grade. Actually, this was really good and had a nice, potato flavor to it. The sunny sprouts were anything but sunny. They actually tasted a little soapy, which I think was the mustard/margarine on them. Besides that everything was good stuff that I grabbed from the salad bar.

After that I had 2 classes per usual. I gave my friend in Greek History a vegan pumpkin molasses cookie. At first she didn’t want it because she thought I found it on the floor, but when I told her I made it she took a bite and said “That’s a freakin awesome cookie” Couldn’t have said it better myself Up next was Epic Poetry which I got a bit hungry during so I had a peanut butter Z-Bar I had in my pocket. After class I went back out to CVS to get the batteries.

Tip 4: When in doubt, take a Whole Foods trip

While I was 1/3 the way to Whole Foods, rather than do my homework like a good student, I felt like grabbing some essentials. When I got there I was pleasantly surprised with this:

Farmers' Market

I forgot that the Farmers’ Market that’s on my quad on Wednesdays is at this Whole Foods on Mondays. I grabbed a Macintosh apple because I was super snacky. I actually kept it really brief in Whole Foods because I felt bad about being there in the first place. I think I was in and out in 10 minutes!

Shopping Loot

I picked up my favorite Greek yogurt, my favorite plain yogurt, batteries, and a yam from the Farmers’ Market. The yam and apple together were only 1 dollar, which was a pretty great steal. Not to mention it’s adorably sized and perfect for 1 person. I needed 2 things when I got back to my dorm: to pee like a race horse and get some food in me.

Pumpkin Oats With Maple Almond Butter And Sliced Almonds

Tip 5: Go nuts. They support the healthy fats in your brain

Once the former was taken care of, I plugged in the batteries to my food scale and got to work with some grains–perfectly cooked this time. This is my original pumpkin oats that I was making way back in July: oats with Libby’s canned pumpkin, Justin’s maple almond butter, and sliced salted almonds. It’s a great salty/sweet almond dish. And I must have been hungry because I scarfed this down(eating a bowl of oatmeal in under an hour is scarfing for me). I knew I had a lot of work ahead of me so I called the person I was planning on meeting for dinner to reschedule. Instead I got take out from the dining hall, got some stuff accomplished, and made my meal:

Broccoli, Sweet Potato, Beets, Vegan Taco Beans, Orange Zevia

Tip 6: Blow off your friend to study, but end up blogging

Eating in my room might not be something I want to get used to, but it’s damn good when I do. For instance, I can tap into my small hoard of Zevias The beets and broccoli and sweet potato were all great, plain and salted with a little cinnamon on the sweet potato. The taco filling wasn’t bad, it was just interesting. I liked it more than I was expecting to, but it mostly just tasted like seasoned black beans and didn’t have the flavor or consistency of taco filling.

Tip 7: Unwind to your favorite television programs

For Monday Television I had to decide between CBS and NBC. Since HIMYM is only 30 minutes and Heroes is an hour, it made sense to go with Heroes for night. While it was on I talked to my parents and heard I have a package waiting from Nature’s Path back at my house(!!). Way to not help me concentrate for the rest of the night. This also didn’t help me concentrate on anything but how delicious it was:

Fig And Almond Blondie, Figs In Yogurt With Vanilla Sugar

Trader Joes All Natural Halloween Gummies

Tip 8: Suuuuugar

This used up the last of my big container of plain yogurt; see why I have to go out to Whole Foods every day?(Besides the fact that I love it, of course) The figs were more than ripe being almost 2 weeks old, but a go in the microwave made them soft and juicy. And if I’m only ever going to have sugar in moderation, I choose this vanilla sugar from Whole Foods. It has real vanilla beans! How cool is that? The gummies from Trader Joe’s were also decent; I think they’re more of a novelty for your average 5 year old who refuses to eat artificial flavors, colors, or preservatives.

Heroes was OK. Next week looks a bit better, especially with the preview about Claire and her roommate(what on earth could that have been about?) After that I watched Two And A Half Men. When did the boy in that become older than me? And yet they pretend like he’s still 12. It doesn’t work. And after a month or so I’m ready to confess how much I love the 10pm Jay Leno show; it’s so nice to have a program that you can count on being at least halfway decent every night at the same time, that isn’t a rerun.

Something was telling me I didn’t eat enough fuel during the day so I didn’t hesitate to load up before bed. I think this was the first muffin where I’ve eaten the bottom part before the top. Oh, and clearly I buy cholesterol free chocolate brownies to smear cholesterol directly on it. JK. I love my cream cheese and could/would never think of giving it up. I liked it here because it tapered the sweetness of the chocolate, which was nice right before bed.

Tip 10: Early to bed, early to rise.

I was able to fall asleep pretty well because my roommate was off working on a project with his friend(or maybe just partying, who knows) and was up by 7. It was pretty easy to decide today’s run: until the machine turns off or 8:30, whichever comes first. I got to the gym early so I knew I had a full hour in me I felt great and ran a strong 7.48 in my hour. I could have gone a full 10 miles this morning I think but I didn’t want to be late fore anything.

I was really feeling oats on this cold October morning, but I didn’t want to be running to class with a bowl in my hands so I kept it portable. I think Chobani tastes good but they go a bit sugar happy in their yogurts; when I have fruit sweetened yogurt I want all the sugar to come from lactose and the fruit, and would rather have a little cream in their instead of plain nonfat. To thicken it up, I added a tablespoon of flax and 1/4 cup canned pumpkin And I topped it off with a vegan pumpkin molasses cookie because… well why would I not?

No Responses to “How To Ace An Exam”

You are very wise: great tips!
The blondie looks delish I praise you for getting out of whole foods in 10 mins, I don’t think I could ever make food shopping trips shorter than half an hour (and that’s a minimum!).

xx

P.S. Please avoid killer pocketknife-pencil-sharpening-girl, I like you and your blog and don’t want you to get killed….

Oh my god, this blog cracked me up. Between the knife girl and your friend who thought you gave her floor cookies – hilarious!

Have you heard of Farm Fresh RI? The are the ones that help sponsor the farmer’s markets throughout the state – http://www.farmfreshri.org – and they are awesomeeeee. There are markets almost every day of the week somewhere around Providence, and they also run a winter time indoor market in Pawtucket. I volunteer with them, so I am pretty biased, but they are cool people even if I didn’t know them

haha i love cray people in class. it’s good to give them names… i had the same major as a girl we named “stupid question girl”. she once raised her hand SIXTY SIX times in a 90 minute class.
and good luck on the test!

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About Me

My name is Evan and I'm a student at a New England university. I blog about health tips, recipes, and product reviews. Have any questions? Want your product to be featured on my site? Drop me an email at Evan@FoodMakesFunFuel.com and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.